Each year, millions of trees are planted in our urban landscape; along city streets, in parks and in our back yards. Our hope is that they will grow, improve the value of our property with their beauty, help to cool hardscapes with the shade of their full canopies, provide habitat, block cold and wind and filter Green House Gases from the atmosphere in a way that only trees can do. Sadly, most of the trees we plant in our communities may never reach their full potential. These smaller and shorter-lived trees have more difficulty coping with urban soils, succumb to more stress related disease and invasive pest problems. Smaller and shorter-lived trees offer fewer aesthetic and environmental benefits at an untold cost to our planet and us.
Trees grown in mass production for the purpose of resale are generally grown in a field or in a container of some type. There is great potential for nursery stock trees to develop defective roots, yet remediation of the defects is seldom done because there is little visibility of the root system inside the root ball or below ground when planted in the landscape.
While growing in the nursery location, trees are often planted too deep in the ground or in some type of container; thus the tree stem is below grade of the soil surface. This practice helps to keep the trees from falling over with little or no staking needed. The field grown trees are often harvested by using a spade machine that cuts a root ball from the soil and it is then placed into a ‘bag & burlap’ wrap and/or a container of some type. Wire baskets are often used for larger root balls to help in storage of and/or transporting the trees.
When planted in the landscape, healthy tree root systems grow shallow (mostly within 18 to 20 inches below grade) with a spreading habit that extends a great distance from the stem of the tree. It is important to retain a sufficient amount of good quality roots for them to grow into healthy trees with a stable structure to promote the long-term benefits that only trees can provide.
With my invention, tree root examination, evaluation and standardization system, an apparatus using ground penetrating radar (GPR) technology applied to a new method of use will offer meaningful and useful information to evaluate and remediate root defects.
The following four examples represent some of the problems with tree roots that occur out of sight, below grade of the soil surface, however these examples are without limitation. The trees' long-term health, sustainability, value, and opportunity to provide aesthetic and most importantly, ecologic benefits are greatly diminished; unless the problems are detected and corrected. (For these examples the consumer is comprised of, but not limited to, wholesale suppliers, retail suppliers, developers, landscapers, arborists, municipalities, foresters, homeowners, ecosystems, the environment.)
Problem 1 currently occurs during harvest of field grown trees using a tree spade. When a nursery tree is planted too deep, the tree spade can cut as much as 80% to 90% of the critical roots off the tree at the time of harvest. The tree is then placed in a wire basket with bag & burlap or a container of some type for storage and/or transportation.
The consumer is unable to objectively evaluate the complexity of the root structure in soil to determine root defects and/or judge the current and long-term value of the investment.
Problem 2 currently occurs when harvested trees (as noted in Problem 1) remain in wire basket with bag & burlap or a container of some type for excessive periods of time. In this case, the tree roots could begin to grow in a circular fashion in the confined space. Also, a secondary root system can begin to grow from the stem below grade of the soil level also in a circling pattern. The longer the tree remains in a container, the more likely the root structure will be compromised.
The consumer is unable to objectively evaluate the complexity of the root structure in soil to determine root defects and/or judge the current and long-term value of the investment.
Problem 3 currently occurs when a tree has been grown in a container. The process generally requires transplanting the tree multiple times as it outgrows each smaller container. (For example, from a 2″ container, to 4″, to 6″ to 10″ and so on.) The trees roots tend to grow in a circular pattern with containerized plants (as noted in Problem 2) and this becomes very serious to the tree with stem circling roots in a number of layers through the container's root ball. “Stem girdling roots” is a root collar disorder where the roots grow tightly around the tree stem. The conflict eventually results in extreme compression of the woody and nonwoody tissue of the stem, interfering with the hydraulic process to transport water and food to the crown from the roots and carbohydrates from the crown to be stored in the roots. If the disorder of stem girdling roots goes uncorrected, it could cause decline of health, loss of productivity and early death of the tree.
The consumer is unable to objectively evaluate the complexity of the root structure in soil to determine root defects and/or judge the current and long-term value of the investment.
Problem 4 currently occurs when a tree has been planted in the urban landscape and is experiencing distress due to the critical root structure that has been compromised. This could be due to many things including but not limited to: failure to remove wire basket, bag & burlap fabric, planting too deep, condition of stem girdling roots or any number of conditions resulting in a root collar disorder.
The planted trees, present a challenge to the consumer in an attempt to perform best maintenance practices in caring for the trees in order to maximize the tree benefits.
The Morton Arboreturn-Urban Tree Roots Systems http://www.mortonarb.org/urban-tree-root-systems.html:                “It is estimated that over 80% of all landscape problems originate below ground, but even basic knowledge about urban soils and root management is lacking.”        
The consumer is unable to objectively evaluate the complexity of the root structure in soil to determine root defects and/or judge the current and long-term value of the investment.
Often, by the time the tree has signs of decline due to root disorder, it has been too severely compromised to warrant the effort and expense required to correct the problem. This is a list, but without limitation, of some economic and environmental impacts when the trees we plant die long before their time: cost to replace trees, repair property damaged by tree failure, liability for property damage and person injury, property value, impact on the environment for opportunity loss of Green House Gases avoidance and sequestration, cooling from shade, ecosystem watershed filtration, noise reduction and the ability to support wildlife habitat will be at risk with less healthy, less sustainable trees in the urban landscape.